Jamie Foxx

Best Night of My Life - Fairly Good, Based on 5 Critics

Rolling Stone - 100Based on rating 5/5

100

If you want depth from Jamie Foxx, go see one of his movies. On his fourth album, Foxx dedicates himself almost entirely to hard-edged party tunes and sexed-up ballads, making for a convincing Casanova on the thundering bedroom jam "Hit It Like This." The one break from the good times is "Fall for Your Type," a somber track in which Foxx drops into a pained purr and gives guest Drake a run for his melancholy-player money. It's refreshing to hear him finally switch up his script.

In the world of multifaceted talents, there are few entertainment powerhouses that have been as commercially successful as Jamie Foxx. As a comedian, actor, music producer, and singer, he has acquired Academy and Grammy awards and placed himself among the industry’s elite. With Best Night of My Life Foxx carries on his tradition of vocal abilities and continues to try his hand at self-producing some of his songs.

With cameos from Justin Timberlake, T.I., and Drake, among others, Foxx’s latest, Best Night of My Life, boasts an all-star guest list worthy of its title. Yet the Oscar-winning actor musters little of his usual charisma here, especially in crowded hip-hop tracks such as ”Yep Dat’s Me,” which Ludacris steals like a cartoon villain. Foxx fares better in the sleek R&B stuff — even if ”15 Minutes” is an R.

An album like Best Night of My Life has a tall task in proving, against every indication, that it’s not entirely pointless. By this point, Jamie Foxx attempting an R&B vanity project has lots its novelty appeal, and the album’s swollen stable of guest stars hardly elicits as much surprise as Foxx would like—nothing spectacular at a time when so many hip-hop songs feel as chummy and crowded as treehouses. Yet despite the fact that so much of what is exhibited here is nonsense, that Foxx’s attempts at winsome buoyancy and dirty talk seem visibly forced, never challenging his status as a mildly charming cipher, the album somehow justifies its own existence.

The problem with Jamie Foxx as a musician is, anyone that grew up with his comedy routine knows that Jamie has always been reasonably talented. Not in a Motown or Stax sort of sense, certainly, but the man can sing and handle himself on a piano if he has to. So the fact that he finds himself on the wrong side of 40 making music that appeals more to high school dances than folks his own age is… awkward.